Category Archives: Politics

Everyone loves politics!

As you may recall, some time ago there was a young American businessman named Nick Berg, who was brutally decapitated by one Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Now, two years later, al-Zarqawi has been killed in a targeted airstrike.

CNN interviewed Michael Berg, Nick Berg’s father, to see what he had to say.

O’BRIEN: Mr. Berg, thank you for talking with us again. It’s nice to have an opportunity to talk to you. Of course, I’m curious to know your reaction, as it is now confirmed that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the man who is widely credited and blamed for killing your son, Nicholas, is dead.

MICHAEL BERG: Well, my reaction is I’m sorry whenever any human being dies. Zarqawi is a human being. He has a family who are reacting just as my family reacted when Nick was killed, and I feel bad for that.

I feel doubly bad, though, because Zarqawi is also a political figure, and his death will re-ignite yet another wave of revenge, and revenge is something that I do not follow, that I do want ask for, that I do not wish for against anybody. And it can’t end the cycle. As long as people use violence to combat violence, we will always have violence.

O’BRIEN: I have to say, sir, I’m surprised. I know how devastated you and your family were, frankly, when Nick was killed in such a horrible, and brutal and public way.

BERG: Well, you shouldn’t be surprised, because I have never indicated anything but forgiveness and peace in any interview on the air.

O’BRIEN: No, no. And we have spoken before, and I’m well aware of that. But at some point, one would think, is there a moment when you say, ‘I’m glad he’s dead, the man who killed my son’?

BERG: No. How can a human being be glad that another human being is dead?

O’BRIEN: There have been family members who have weighed in, victims, who’ve said that they don’t think he’s a martyr in heaven, that they think, frankly, he went straight to hell …

You know, you talked about the fact that he’s become a political figure. Are you concerned that he becomes a martyr and a hero and, in fact, invigorates the insurgency in Iraq?

BERG: Of course. When Nick was killed, I felt that I had nothing left to lose. I’m a pacifist, so I wasn’t going out murdering people. But I am — was not a risk-taking person, and yet now I’ve done things that have endangered me tremendously.

I’ve been shot at. I’ve been showed horrible pictures. I’ve been called all kinds of names and threatened by all kinds of people, and yet I feel that I have nothing left to lose, so I do those things.

Now, take someone who in 1991, who maybe had their family killed by an American bomb, their support system whisked away from them, someone who, instead of being 59, as I was when Nick died, was 5-years-old or 10-years-old. And then If I were that person, might I not learn how to fly a plane into a building or strap a bag of bombs to my back?

That’s what is happening every time we kill an Iraqi, every time we kill anyone, we are creating a large number of people who are going to want vengeance. And, you know, when are we ever going to learn that that doesn’t work?

O’BRIEN: There’s an alternate reading, which would say at some point, Iraqis will say the insurgency is not OK — that they’ll be inspired by the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in the sense of he was turned in, for example, we believe by his own No. 2, No. 3 leadership in his ranks.

And, that’s actually them saying we do not want this kind of violence in our country. Experts whom we’ve spoken to this morning have said this is a critical moment where Iraqis need to figure out which direction the country is going to go. That would be an alternate reading to the scenario you’re pointing to.

BERG: Yes, well, I don’t believe that scenario, because every time news of new atrocities committed by Americans in Iraq becomes public, more and more of the everyday Iraqi people who tried to hold out, who tried to be peaceful people lose it and join — what we call the insurgency, and what I call the resistance, against the occupation of one sovereign nation.

O’BRIEN: There’s a theory that a struggle for democracy, you know…

BERG: Democracy? Come on, you can’t really believe that that’s a democracy there when the people who are running the elections are holding guns. That’s not democracy.

O’BRIEN: There’s a theory that as they try to form some kind of government, that it’s going to be brutal, it’s going to be bloody, there’s going to be loss, and that’s the history of many countries — and that’s just what a lot of people pay for what they believe will be better than what they had under Saddam Hussein.

BERG: Well, you know, I’m not saying Saddam Hussein was a good man, but he’s no worse than George Bush. Saddam Hussein didn’t pull the trigger, didn’t commit the rapes. Neither did George Bush. But both men are responsible for them under their reigns of terror.

I don’t buy that. Iraq did not have al Qaeda in it. Al Qaeda supposedly killed my son.

Under Saddam Hussein, no al Qaeda. Under George Bush, al Qaeda.

Under Saddam Hussein, relative stability. Under George Bush, instability.

Under Saddam Hussein, about 30,000 deaths a year. Under George Bush, about 60,000 deaths a year. I don’t get it. Why is it better to have George Bush the king of Iraq rather than Saddam Hussein?

Rage Aganst The Jerks

Some fifteen year old white kid in FUBU gear at the mall today was talking about how he didn’t like Rage Against The Machine, because they were sell-outs.

It almost made me HULK OUT but being with a co-worker, I had to keep my Bruce Banner on.

Tom Morello’s daddy was a revolutionary, a Mau Mau guerilla who eventually became Kenya’s ambassador to the UN. His mother founded Parents For Rock And Rap, and his great uncle was Kenya’s first elected president.

What of our millionaire friend Zacarías Manuel de la Rocha? He’s in Mexico right now, fighting with the Zapatistas.

You can hate their music, their politics, or their actions, but they were the real thing.

Seriously, fuck that kid.

Kill the Seals

Canada’s annual seal hunt pales in comparison to the slaughter of innocent Iraqis at the hands of the U.S., according to a Liberal senator who defended the hunt to an American family.

The McLellan family of Minnesota sent a letter to all Canadian senators, describing the seal hunt as horrible and inhumane.

Anne McLellan told CTV Newsnet in an interview Friday that her family was, in fact, so appalled by the seal hunt that they cancelled plans to vacation in Canada, despite the fact they love the country and have Canadian ancestry.

“We had thought that they had quit (hunting seals) for many years,” said McLellan. “So we thought, well then, we’re going to not give Canada our tourist dollars.”

Senator Celine Hervieux-Payette penned a terse response to the McLellans, suggesting they should be more concerned about their own government’s treatment of Iraqis.

She didn’t limit her comments to the war, however, pointing out that the true crimes being committed in the world are “the daily massacre of innocent people in Iraq, the execution of prisoners — mainly blacks — in American prisons, the massive sale of handguns to Americans, the destabilization of the entire world by the American government’s aggressive foreign policy, etc.”

Hervieux-Payette told Montreal’s La Presse that Americans should worry about their own country’s behaviour before pointing fingers at other nations.

She sent a copy of her blunt response to other senators, and told La Presse: “all senators received the letter from the McLellans and I was the only one to respond.”

Opposition Leader Bill Graham issued a statement on Friday saying those words “reflect her personal opinions and not those of the Liberal Party of Canada.”

Graham added the Liberals value the friendship and commitment to democratic principles that Canada shares with the U.S.

There is no suggestion that Hervieux-Payette’s comments might bring disciplinary action from her caucus.

McLellan, meanwhile, says her family isn’t about to get involved in the politics behind the debate.

“Our focus is on the inhumane treatment of seals. That’s what our main focus is, so we didn’t want to make it political at all,” she told Newsnet.

Sir Paul McCartney’s recent high-profile protest of the seal hunt brought international media attention to the issue. McCartney and his wife, Heather Mills McCartney, led an entourage of media and animal rights activists onto a Newfoundland ice floe earlier this month, where they posed with harp seal pups.

That led to a debate on CNN’s Larry King Live between Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams and the McCartneys. Williams later said the couple was badly misinformed about the hunt.

In her letter, Hervieux-Payette told the McLellans the centuries-old seal hunt is an important part of the economy for eastern workers and native hunters who rely on the proceeds from the harvest.

“This activity allows the livelihoods of our people in a region where they have been living for centuries,” she wrote.

The Liberal caucus has not issued an official response to the senator’s letter.

Former MP Carolyn Parrish was kicked out of caucus by former prime minister Paul Martin for her comments against U.S. President George Bush. Parrish also stomped on a doll of the U.S. president.

Hervieux-Payette was appointed to the senate in 1995 by former prime minister Jean Chretien.

In 2004 she introduced a private member’s bill to outlaw spanking of children.

All I want to do today is sit at home and listen to Cocteau Twins

As we prepare to sign our country over to the control of the Reptiloids for the next few years, I would like to take a moment to highlight a fine Canadian institution, and their coverage of this, the last free election before we are all sold to the Grays for breeding.

During the last minority government, Macleans ran the finest cover to ever grace a Canadian political magazine:

In addition to the fantastic headline, the art director at Macleans performed an impossible task; in the hearts and minds of many, Jack Layton was no longer a used car salesman. The image was too reminicent of something, someone else, someone someone more sinister…

But who?

…

…

.

or they forgot…

I just thought you should know:

While we’ve been spending our money on high-bandwidth internet access, bad EBM, fusion cuisine and fashionable ribbons with ‘proceeds that go to Tsunami charities’, two million people have become homeless in the Darfur genocide. Hundreds of thousands of Africans and Arabs are dead. That’s the entire population of the old City of Ottawa, gone. The entire population of the City of Toronto, walking the earth, looking for shelter.

And while we’ve all been enthralled and shocked by Michael Jackson’s pyjamas, Johnny Fairplay lying about his grandmother’s death on Survivor: Pearl Islands and a dozen dead people shot by a goth libertarian neonazi, four million people have been killed in civil war in the Congo, where over twenty different armed groups are fighting for dominance and survival. That’s every man, woman and child in the cities of Detroit, San Francisco, Boston, Seattle, and Dallas.

Just so you know what’s been happening while we were busy.

Electoral Whozit? (Or: Bush received more votes than any candidate in US election history)

Dearest America:

You’re a very confusing neighbour. We’re not sure why you hate gay people, why you elected Tom “death-penalty-for-abortion-doctors” Coburn and Jim “single-mothers-and-homos-are-morally-unfit-to-teach” DeMint to the Senate, or what exactly you’re doing in Iraq, for that matter. But it seems very important to you, so we hope you accomplish whatever it is you’re trying to do.

We are, however, very much looking forward to taking weekend shopping trips to NYC after our dollar overtakes yours.

Love,
Canada.

COMMUNIST – 0.034% — MARXIST-LENINIST – 0.067% — MARIJUANA – 0.249%

For those who find such things interesting, here are our current election results:

LIB 135
CON 99
BQ 54
NDP 19
IND 1

…and here is how it would look if we had proportional representation:

LIB 113
CON 91
NDP 47
BQ 39
GREEN 13

—

Liberals + NDP = 154 Seats.
Conservatives + Bloc = 154 Seats. (The IND candidate is a CON that was listed as IND due to a party nomination argument. He’ll be welcomed back to the fold.)

Someone’s going to have to suck some conservative dick tonight if he wants to form a government.

Rapest coming. Don’t get Rapesd.

…and just for shits and giggles, here are some choice excerpts from the Taguba Report, in regards to torture of Iraqi by the US military. To my American Friends: This report has been classified as TOP SECRET. Reading this LJ entry could indeed be punishable by jail time.

Us Canadians, though, don’t have to worry so much.

6. (S) I find that the intentional abuse of detainees by military police personnel included the following acts:

a. (S) Punching, slapping, and kicking detainees; jumping on their naked feet;
b. (S) Videotaping and photographing naked male and female detainees;
c. (S) Forcibly arranging detainees in various sexually explicit positions for photographing;
d. (S) Forcing detainees to remove their clothing and keeping them naked for several days at a time;
e. (S) Forcing naked male detainees to wear women’s underwear;
f. (S) Forcing groups of male detainees to masturbate themselves while being photographed and videotaped;
g. (S) Arranging naked male detainees in a pile and then jumping on them;
h. (S) Positioning a naked detainee on a MRE Box, with a sandbag on his head, and attaching wires to his fingers, toes, and penis to simulate electric torture;
i. (S) Writing “I am a Rapest” (sic) on the leg of a detainee alleged to have forcibly raped a 15-year old fellow detainee, and then photographing him naked;
j. (S) Placing a dog chain or strap around a naked detainee’s neck and having a female Soldier pose for a picture;
k. (S) A male MP guard having sex with a female detainee;
l. (S) Using military working dogs (without muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees, and in at least one case biting and severely injuring a detainee;
m. (S) Taking photographs of dead Iraqi detainees.

d. (U) Mr. Adel L. Nakhla, a US civilian contract translator was questioned about several detainees accused of rape. He observed (sic): “They (detainees) were all naked, a bunch of people from MI, the MP were there that night and the inmates were ordered by SGT Granier and SGT Frederick ordered the guys while questioning them to admit what they did. They made them do strange exercises by sliding on their stomach, jump up and down, throw water on them and made them some wet, called them all kinds of names such as “gays” do they like to make love to guys, then they handcuffed their hands together and their legs with shackles and started to stack them on top of each other by insuring that the bottom guys penis will touch the guy on tops butt.”

33. (S/NF) The various detention facilities operated by the 800th MP Brigade have routinely held persons brought to them by Other Government Agencies (OGAs) without accounting for them, knowing their identities, or even the reason for their detention. The Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center (JIDC) at Abu Ghraib called these detainees “ghost detainees.” On at least one occasion, the 320th MP Battalion at Abu Ghraib held a handful of “ghost detainees” (6-8) for OGAs that they moved around within the facility to hide them from a visiting International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) survey team. This maneuver was deceptive, contrary to Army Doctrine, and in violation of international law. (Annex 53)

a wicked law, like cholera, destroys everyone it touches

Drug War Victims:

John Hirko, 21 years old: An unarmed man with no prior offenses was shot to death in his house by a squad of masked police. In a no-knock raid, they tossed a smoke grenade in through a window, setting the house on fire. Hirko, suspected of dealing small amounts of marijuana and cocaine, was found face down on his stairway, shot in the back while fleeing the burning building. When the fire was finally put out, officers found some marijuana seeds in an unsinged plastic bag.

Tony Marinez, 19 years old: Officers conducted a drug raid on a mobile home in De Valle. Martinez, who was not the target of the raid, was asleep on the couch when the raid commenced. Hearing the front door smashed open, he sat up, and was shot to death in the chest.

Alberto Sepulveda, 11 years old: Alberto was killed by a shotgun blast to the back while following police orders and lying face down on the floor during a SWAT raid. He was a seventh-grader at Prescott Senior Elementary School.

(More at Drug WarRant.)

Moving over and making room

Starbucks was hit by a well-organized culturejam last night. Locks were jammed, ‘For Lease’ signs were hung, and fake notices on Starbucks letterhead were attached to the windows:

“The global economy requires a relentless substitution of quantity over quality and shareholder value over human values. At our current market level, Starbucks cannot in good conscience guarantee all of our beans meet both our rigorous quality standards as well as our commitment to social responsibility. We are moving over and making room for local coffee bars.”

Less than 1% of Starbucks coffee is fair trade, and if you try hard enough, you can taste the jet fuel they use to roast the beans.

So you will have another ticket, for losing your senses.

A brief history of Canada’s marijuana laws is relevant reading, considering the Prime Minister’s recent assurance that pot is soon to be decriminalized, and our friendly neighbour to the south’s not-so-veiled threats.

I firmly believe the Bush administration will bring about the end of American-Canadian trust and goodwill. This is just one action of many.

A Chill Wind

More Tim Robbins – A Transcript of Robbins’ Speech to the National Press Club:

“In the 19 months since 9-11, we have seen our democracy compromised by fear and hatred. Basic inalienable rights, due process, the sanctity of the home have been quickly compromised in a climate of fear. A unified American public has grown bitterly divided, and a world population that had profound sympathy and support for us has grown contemptuous and distrustful, viewing us as we once viewed the Soviet Union, as a rogue state. “

Long live the ’69 Mets

Tim Robbins vs. the Baseball Hall of Fame:

“I wish you had, in your letter, saved me the rhetoric and talked honestly about your ties to the Bush and Reagan Administrations. You are using what power you have to infringe upon my rights to free speech and by taking this action hope to intimidate the millions of others that disagree with our president. In doing so, you expose yourself as a tool, blinded by partisanship and ambition. You invoke patriotism and use words like freedom in an attempt to intimidate and bully.”